G'day guys as I am sure a few of you know I am lunching a brand new brand of wheel loaders. I am just wondering what would be the biggest selling point / what would make you think about buying?
I'm an auction/distressed buyer and have never bought new, but parts, parts and more parts. I think we've all said "how much for that part", try to curb the sticker shock on parts. Don't charge me for express shipping to get my part the next day, if you can get it to me/my mechanic/my site early the next day I might pay a reasonable amount for that. Should be reliable to start. Nothing worse than having a new machine and needing service in the first few weeks. Tom.
Also guys what about buying a machine with a unknow brand of engine ? as we are looking at producing our own brand of engine for our machines so then we can make sure they are built to our standards. just wondering how people would react to that coming to a parts ponit of view. we have already writen up the contracts stating that if anyone where to become our agents they would need to keep enough stock of parts to build a complete machine of every size they sell.
With an no name engine I would expect a full coverage long warranty, without loopholes. I also wouldn't mind knowing realistic time to failure of consumable parts in real world conditions. Tom
I could've sworn you created this thread before JGS, and my thoughts still remain the same, make a machine with the Operator and Technician as the highest priority. A machine has to be productive and easy to maintain if it's to be cost effective. The less time an Operator has to tend to daily maintenance the more time he or she has to be productive and the more comfortable an Operator is effects how productive they will be and the same applies to a Technician, the less time spent on service the more time the machine is making money. As for a "no" brand engine that's a risk you're asking potential customers to take. Like TEC says, what will be mean time failures be, how will you warranty the engine, how will your parts supply chain work? These are all pertinent and valid questions that you need to ask yourself because potential customers will. I would advise offering a deep discount to a customer and asking them to agree to realtime product development this way you both share some risk. Every new thing has to start somewhere, if you don't have the facilities to conduct long term product testing then you have to reach out to your customer base. If there are problems or issues that arrise you will need the ability to address them quickly which means having technical support 24/7. There are so many variables to bringing a new product to market. Good luck with it!
You buy me lunch and I'll buy your wheel loader? I don't think so...
We got so many brands of machinery here it ain't funny . In this market you basically got to give the first couple of machines to a contractor where other people will see it and let them put a few thousand hours on it . If it is reliable you might have a chance , if it falls to bits , forget it
Depends on what it is JSG. If it is small item that does not have a great deal of affect on the operation, what ever that operation my be, I would be more prone to trying new brand name, provided it would save me money. The more important the piece comes to the operation and more critical it is to maintain production the less apt I am to change the brand of equipment. Case in point here, If it digs in the dirt it is Cat, If it is a big truck it is a Mack, if it is a little truck it is a Ford with a Powerstroke Diesel under the hood, Up to know Cat< Mack and Ford have served me quite well. As far as buying something with a no name engine from china? It is not going to happen. To much history with poor quality from china whether it be dog food, tooth paste, steel, castings of all types, tires and everything else. Around here there is an "avoid chinese" products of all times at all costs. It costs more for me to do that, but pays off in the long run because of less break downs due to inferior materials used in parts and components.
Mate the JGS engines we are looking to manufacture are not Chinese engines they will be a joint venture with a European company that is all i can say at the moment. but i agree with you at first we will introduce our smaller line as i hardly believe that some one will just go in for a large size machine with out trial of smaller machines.
Just a thought here, but instead of putting out your own engine per say, have a name brand manufacturer make the engine to your specs, you control the parts end entirely like most big name manufacturers do anyhow, might be a far better way to go to market the machine than having it totally unknown, at least from the start. As for putting out equipment, I'm up for new machines being made by new manufacturers, first off, you need data you don't have, life expectancy of components is essential in my book, same goes for product testing, put a few machines out there to be demoed by users, pass them around from contractor to contractor, that's you best advertising, sales representation and product knowledge is key. I'm not sure what your making or planning on making, but every company started just like your starting now at some point in time and I don't care who they were, the only thing I can tell you is, do your homework, know your stuff, represent your product, put it out to be used and abused by consumers, offer discounted rates for first time buyers, stand behind your product no matter what, even if it costs you money, never blame the buyer or consumer for any short coming or problem you occur, even if it is their fault, offer great warranties and stand behind them. Listen to the people who are running your machines, especially if they own or operate another brand of machine and your isn't as good at first. Basically put yourself into the same situation your asking others to do, what would it take to get you to buy a totally new brand of vehicle out on the market, most of the questions you have you can answer yourself, its the same thing that others will do when they look at your product. To me its about price, warranty, repair parts, support network, dealers, knowledgeable repair technicians, timely repairs, cost effective repair parts and the list is pretty long. I can tell you this much though, the name on the machine means little to me if it has the rest of the stuff I'm wanting. I'm not name brand loyal to anyone, I own a pretty large diverse amount of equipment, from most all manufacturers, some even out of business or been bought out or merged into another manufacturer, if parts are still available I'll keep them and keep using them if I like the machine. The single biggest problem I have with start up companies is the lack of track record and parts availability is unknown, but that might not be a big deal to others.
Yair . . . I know y'all are probably sick of me banging me old drum but I get the feeling around here if you said there were no electronic controls, no computers and some nice round gauges on the dash you might get a few lookers. LOL Cheers.
Just call it a Kenworth Loader!
Like Scrub said, make a non computer controlled version and computer controlled version. Produce machines and trial them out to well known big company for free to get your name out their.
I agree with Scrub Puller, less electrical gizmos the better. But the new and untried engine just stopped my interest.
Well mate just so you know we have decided for the foreseen future we will be running original cummins from England not chinese cummins and also Perkins engines in the smaller machines we will hold off the JGS engines until we see it as a viable option for our machines.
Well Scrub Puller we are lunching 2 models they will be different in the fact that the A models will be running a more back to basics with less electronics and basicly no computers and also a C model that will have all the bells and gizoms we have seen that it is needed to do this. as frankly speaking there is large enough markets for both machines in our view we are actually finishing our first 2 A models in the next few days just small loaders but all got to start some where.
Cummins and Perkins just got my interest back! Good luck with your new venture
:usa:usa:usa:usa:usaThis may or may not be the right place for this post, but here goes anyway. It deals not with trying a new brand but instead the return to an old brand. I visited a steel fabrication shop today where I purchase steel for use in my shop for ongoing jobs as well as maintenance. When I was picking up steel I noticed a great deal of the inventory in the area where I was with the following tag. "Nucor Steel Company, Kankakee, Illinois. Proudly made in the United States." I could not help but mention this at the office when checking out. I was told that much of the customer base which this facility serves has told them they will not accept items made from imported chinese and other third world steel due to the ongoing and continous quality problems. This company is a supplier of fabricated components used by other companies in their end products as well as a properitry line which they produce. Return items as well as warranty claims from both markets were far in excess of what they felt was acceptable levels. So they have returned to using only United States manufactured steel. This is also the case in many other manufacturing companies here in the United States. So, before anyone expects to break into a market here they had better understand quality and be able to produce it too
For us to try a new brand, we would have to get the same quality and service that we have now. Which would be mostly Cat and some Deere. In this industry you just can't compromise with proven quality. I might get bashed for this, but hey it is what it is. We've tried Case, Komatsu, Hitachi, and Hyundai. In the end we always end up buying Caterpillar or John Deere (I know our 230C Deere is Hitachi, but I'm not impressed with how that thing is holding together for only 6,800 hours).